No Coast Bias

In Defense of Peeps, Easter’s Greatest Confectionary Pariah

If you clicked on this link, it’s likely that you fall into one of two camps: either you’re someone who is repulsed at the mere mention of Peeps, the pastel colored amalgam of artificial sweeteners and mallow, or you’re someone with an insatiable sweet tooth who embraces the hyperglycemic tsunami of granulated sugar and yellow dye #5 each year around this time.

Now, it certainly is possible to land somewhere in the middle, to be relatively lukewarm on this, the hottest of Easter takes. But, it’s not very likely.

If you hate them, love them, or if you are one of those rare, uncut diamonds that doesn’t have an Easter-egg colored bird in the fight, brace yourself: winter is leaving.

And what does that reverse-ominous statement really mean in April of 2017? That you’re about to be inundated by withering, scalding, 140-character hatred for these innocent little piles of caloric insanity. What used to be a mild, passing distaste for Peeps has suddenly become a groundswell with a vocal social media mob of Anti-Peeps Peeps. Just type it into Twitter in the search section and you’ll see it. Pictures of garbage cans.

All of this on the heels of a report from The Morning Call that Peeps’ popularity has dropped to a shocking new low:

It begs the question: have Peeps become an underdog story?

In America, we root for underdogs. We pine for them. We go fully ham when a 2-seed botches their innumerable gifts on the court and loses to a scrappy squad of 15-seed basketball players. Now is that time for Peeps.

Do they taste kind of like a sponge dipped in bland pixie stick sugar? Sure. Are they probably linked to cancer and/or have another study out that proves that they reduce the risks? Probably. Does that mean we should be subjected to hundreds of drive-by Twitter assassinations shot directly from the barrel of the semi-automatic, kale-stained fingers of the hipster masses? No.

Look, I get it. It’s cool to hate on things now more than ever. Our day to day lives have turned into the Playa Hater’s Ball sketch from Chappelle’s Show (*Author’s note: RIP to Charlie Murphy, a truly hilarious and legendary performer on the greatest comedy show of all time). But, you know what else is super cool right now? Hate-watching things. We tune into shows we don’t like, subject ourselves to presidential speeches that infuriate us, and spend countless hours breaking down dive bars and bad music with equal vigor. So why not let your weird relative in the jorts smash through a few Peeps at the family barbecue, judgement free?

In fact, why not join them?

The world has enough angst and misery. Why not let yourself be distracted by this neon sign of absurdity, this brief pause button from the real world? Don’t stress about the Veep, have a Peep. Instead of being woke, let yourself slip into the sweet, potassium-sorbate-induced slumber of ignorance being bliss.

I’ll leave you, now, with this picturesque image of eating champion — and, frankly, just regular champion, based on this video — Matthew Stonie as he devours 255 Peeps in just 5 minutes to shatter his own world record. Happy Easter, everyone!